Hello Everyone. It is a pleasure to finally introduce myself. I have been a casual visitor to DhammaWheel for some time now and learned a great deal from the myriad discussions on this forum. The hope now is that through active participation there will be much more wisdom to be had.

As a brief introduction… I am a relatively recent college graduate currently working in the finance industry (I am curious as to how the Buddha would have viewed modern finance in the context of Right Livelihood given what we all now know post 2008) while simultaneously back in school pursuing a graduate degree. In my early college years AccessToInsight was my best friend, but I am now happy to announce that this particle circle has expanded to include WisdomPubs the “Teachings of The Buddha” and now DhammaWheel.

I truly look forward to meeting and learning from all of you.

...the cause, the germ, of the arising of dukkha is within dukkha itself, and not outside; and we must equally well remember that the cause, the germ, of the cessation of dukkha, of the destruction of dukkha, is also within dukkha itself, and not outside. -- Walpola Rahula, "What The Buddha Taught"

“No lists of things to be done. The day providential to itself. The hour. There is no later. This is later. All things of grace and beauty such that one holds them to one's heart have a common provenance in pain. Their birth in grief and ashes.” - Cormac McCarthy, The Road

Learn this from the waters:in mountain clefts and chasms,loud gush the streamlets,but great rivers flow silently.- Sutta Nipata 3.725

---The trouble is that you think you have time------Worry is the Interest, paid in advance, on a debt you may never owe------It's not what happens to you in life that is important ~ it's what you do with it ---

shipwright wrote:(I am curious as to how the Buddha would have viewed modern finance in the context of Right Livelihood given what we all now know post 2008)

What is it that everyone (except me, it seems) now knows about modern finance post-2008?

Dhammanando... I am afraid that a discussion on what went wrong with our modern finance and banking industry culminating in what has been called the “financial crisis” could quite possibly warrant an entire discussion forum all its own. But if one were to give a root cause it would be “greed”. Insatiable and never-ending greed.

If any of you would like some bedtime reading that is guaranteed to put you to sleep, below are some Wikipedia pages attempting to shed light on what happened.

...the cause, the germ, of the arising of dukkha is within dukkha itself, and not outside; and we must equally well remember that the cause, the germ, of the cessation of dukkha, of the destruction of dukkha, is also within dukkha itself, and not outside. -- Walpola Rahula, "What The Buddha Taught"

shipwright wrote:Dhammanando... I am afraid that a discussion on what went wrong with our modern finance and banking industry culminating in what has been called the “financial crisis” could quite possibly warrant an entire discussion forum all its own.

Well, thanks for the links. I scarcely followed world news at all in 2008.

This is a very enviable position in so many ways. Often time’s world news and politics seem nothing more than the world’s biggest recurring soap opera… with the same themes, characters, and plot lines. Each time one thinks, “Surely we must have learned our lesson. Surely things will be different this time.” Unfortunately, all too often this is not the case.

Jerrod Lopes... Thank you for the warm welcome. Yes... I have already taken to reading some of your recent posts, very insightful. I look forward to seeing you around as well.

...the cause, the germ, of the arising of dukkha is within dukkha itself, and not outside; and we must equally well remember that the cause, the germ, of the cessation of dukkha, of the destruction of dukkha, is also within dukkha itself, and not outside. -- Walpola Rahula, "What The Buddha Taught"